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Libertarianism vs Objectivism

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Dániel Boros

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I am not going get involved in that dispute to ascertain who was right. At the time that dispute happened, I did not know DH existed. At least Sciabarra had written a book (which I have read to completion.)

On the topic of what is appropriate to post on a forum, or at least this forum, the posts should be about Objectivism, not Objectivists. Posts should be removed that are essentially addressed to the alleged shortcomings of a person. Posts, not posters. (What gets posters banned is a pattern of misbehavior.)

If a post has the pattern "Person of Note X wrote this, are here is why that is wrong" then fine. If its "Person of Note X broke a promise to me, they are subjectivist evaders who should be boycotted and ostracized by right thinking persons everywhere" then they can post that on their own web page not here. Neither should Person of Note X be permitted space to respond, because there would be nothing here to respond to. X can respond on his own web page. Such disputes revolve around information that no third person reader of a forum could possibly have access to and filled with misrepresentation by hearsay. They are hopelessly non-objective from anyone else's perspective but the participants. I can't fathom why they go public with such disputes even on their on web pages.

Whether uninvolved posters a, b, and c should be permitted to start and participate in a thread which is essentially "wooo, look at the flame war over there" is the borderline case. Depending on how the thread evolves it could stay or be stopped. For example, it is of note when John McCaskey resigns, it is perfectly reasonable to not understand why and state that on a forum, but derisive name-calling attacks such "Pope Leonard" are not reasonable.

Objectivity is the standard.

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For example, it is of note when John McCaskey resigns, it is perfectly reasonable to not understand why and state that on a forum, but derisive name-calling attacks such "Pope Leonard" are not reasonable.

Objectivity is the standard.

When it comes to name-calling, I agree with Rand's statements on humor:

"Humor is the denial of metaphysical importance to that which you laugh at. The classic example: you see a very snooty, very well dressed dowager walking down the street, and then she slips on a banana peel . . . . What’s funny about it? It’s the contrast of the woman’s pretensions to reality. She acted very grand, but reality undercut it with a plain banana peel. That’s the denial of the metaphysical validity or importance of the pretensions of that woman. Therefore, humor is a destructive element—which is quite all right, but its value and its morality depend on what it is that you are laughing at. If what you are laughing at is the evil in the world (provided that you take it seriously, but occasionally you permit yourself to laugh at it), that’s fine. [To] laugh at that which is good, at heroes, at values, and above all at yourself [is] monstrous . . . . The worst evil that you can do, psychologically, is to laugh at yourself. That means spitting in your own face."

"Humor is not an unconditional virtue; its moral character depends on its object. To laugh at the contemptible, is a virtue; to laugh at the good, is a hideous vice. Too often, humor is used as the camouflage of moral cowardice."

Certain acts of name-calling are the act of humorously denying the metaphysical importance of the behavior that is being laughed at. As you say, Grames, objectivity is the standard, and it remains the standard even if it is aimed at prominent members of the Objectivist movement.

J

Edited by Jonathan13
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I don't think it's prejudice. The fact that Robert is a new poster here doesn't mean that he has no knowledge of certain moderators' behavior. Robert is a regular reader and contributor at OL, so it's quite likely that he's read some of my detailed accounts, including a lot of evidence, of moderators' actions here.

J

So it was a preemptive strike in the form of a threat based on second hand accounts.

I still think it was inappropriate.

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I am among those who have likened her to Comrade Sonia.

I have also gone into considerable detail—by way of describing the means she employed to get into the good graces of persons in leadership positions at the Ayn Rand Institute, and by way of refuting her purported reasons.

Well there goes my thunder. But as I said here, I wasn’t ever going to get around to writing up a properly documented explanation. Reviewing the topic is an awfully masochistic endeavor, rather like watching Roderick Spode assaulting an asparagus for hours on end.

'Have you ever seen Spode eat asparagus?'

'No.'

'Revolting. It alters one's whole conception of Man as Nature's last word.'

P.G. Wodehouse,
The Code of the Woosters

Actually, more seriously, it called to mind a phrase from Thucydides, one that I typically associate with Barack Obama for an obvious reason:

[One] is not honest if, seeking to carry a discreditable measure, and knowing that he cannot speak well in a bad cause, he reflects that he can slander well and terrify his opponents and his audience by the audacity of his calumnies.
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To get a bit more on topic.. (bolded for emphasis)

Though Objectivism is not a political party, and though the philosophy encompasses far more than politics, it makes sense that -- to take political action -- like-minded Objectivists would act in concert to achieve political change. ..

So if the Libertarian party is hopeless for this purpose and cannot be salvaged, that's fine. But what then? Do we need an "Objectivist party"? Or are we saying that the Republican party is somehow more closely aligned to Objectivist philosophy...?

Aren't Objectivists (which is not to say "Objectivism" necessarily, but possibly including "prominent Objectivists") continually arguing that we ought to support X Lesser Evil in politics, and specifically because it is the "lesser evil"? Am I imagining/misremembering that happening?

If we agree that by supporting a presidential candidate, we are not sanctioning the entire party's ideologies- then doesn't it follow that by comparing all the candidates running for pres, we should support the best possible candidate, most aligned with our principles?

From what I've read, in most recent previous elections, the best possible candidates were running as Libertarians. (Note: I'm not talking about all LP candidates- like Russell Means and the other nutty LPC's I mentioned earlier- I wanted to discuss only the guys who actually got the LP ticket.)

I know TOS, LP, and others, argue that there are only two realistic candidates in presidential races. They argue that it is not pragmatic, but fully principled to vote for the lesser evil, given the reality of the situation- Democrats and Republicans are the majority, so only a D or a R will win the election. TOS, for example, says "even if Johnson could win, his choice to join the Libertarian Party, not to mention his suicidal foreign policy, would disqualify him."

So there are two things TOS doesn't like about the current LP- that he's running as a Libertarian, and his foreign policy is not consistent with Oist principles. The first point is irrelevant given that we are voting for a candidate and not his party. (Also, I would not be so quick to write off a candidate just because he represents a political minority, or because he is not a typical D or R candidate.) The second point, if indeed valid, is certainly not unique to Johnson. Where is TOS' critique of Romney's and Obama's foreign policy?

When I do a comparison of all the candidates, Romney and Obama are not aligned with my views on many of the issues that I find important.. whereas TOS can only find two valid problems with Johnson (he represents a minority, and his foreign policy is 'bad'- although they don't explain the issues they have with his foreign policy ideas, or compare them with the faults in Romney or Obama's FP plan). Overall, that is maybe -2 for Johnson, compared with the -40? or -50? for both Romney and Obama.

[Edit: I think it's worth noting that TOS advocates not just voting for the lesser evil- Romney, but also financially endorsing and publicly supporting him.]

Edited by mdegges
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If we agree that by supporting a presidential candidate, we are not sanctioning the entire party's ideologies- then doesn't it follow that by comparing all the candidates running for pres, we should support the best possible candidate, most aligned with our principles?

No, that can be self-defeating.

If Ayn Rand was running third party TOS would still vote either democrat or republican.

Yes, and rightfully so.

A poker player who only considers his own hand and not how he can be beaten by cards in other players' hands is a sure loser. An election is the kind of zero-sum game addressed by game theory, a specialty in mathematics, so this can be proven deductively as well as by experience.

Edited by Grames
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Is The Objective Standard still aligned, even loosely, with the Ayn Rand Institute?

If it still is, I should think that the positions taken by Craig Biddle, et al. would not too often be at odds with those of Yaron Brook, Leonard Peikoff, et al.

Robert Campbell

Edited by Robert Campbell
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It does not apply to elections. Or poker. Or lifeboat emergencies. Or prisoner's dilemma. Or ...

Grames- It's annoying that with four half-sentences and an analogy to poker, you can completely change my mind on an issue.

As for the point of financially and publicly voicing support for the least-worst candidate, I assume you would say that by not doing so, you are unintentionally advocating throwing votes away that could have, if used instead to support the least-worst candidate, prevented a disaster.

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As for the point of financially and publicly voicing support for the least-worst candidate, I assume you would say that by not doing so, you are unintentionally advocating throwing votes away that could have, if used instead to support the least-worst candidate, prevented a disaster.

Double double negative overload.

If one has the money to burn on electioneering efforts, then the logic supporting the least worst that can win stands. Whether one can afford to financially contribute is a different issue that depends on factors beyond the logic supporting the least worst.

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A poker player who only considers his own hand and not how he can be beaten by cards in other players' hands is a sure loser. An election is the kind of zero-sum game addressed by game theory, a specialty in mathematics, so this can be proven deductively as well as by experience.

It is because of the "vote the lesser of two evils" mentality that the U.S. has a two party system. If everyone follows the herd there will be no third party candidates. Of course there will be none, but if a substantial number of people refuse to vote things may change one day.

So Mr. Poker since you have been using this strategy how much did you win? The strategy isn't working. In Atlas Shrugged the capitalists supported big government by simply doing what they do best. Making stuff, yet the people who would rather go to Galt's Atlantis seem to be always wrong.

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It is because of the "vote the lesser of two evils" mentality that the U.S. has a two party system.

I don't think the general voter preference for the two parties has anything to do with "vote the lesser of two evils." The 3rd parties we have are not considered superior but unlikely to win. They are, in fact, regarded as fringe parties with a loopy ideas and bad candidates. You cannot project onto most voters an attitude they don't claim to possess.

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It is because of the "vote the lesser of two evils" mentality that the U.S. has a two party system. If everyone follows the herd there will be no third party candidates.

There are institutional reasons for this as well.

The United States uses first-past-the-post voting (except for President and Vice-President, but even then it's first-past-the-post voting to carry each entire state except Maine and Nebraska).

In many states, the winner doesn't even have to get 50% + 1, just a plurality.

Not an electoral system that favors multiple parties.

Let's not even get into cases in which the Federal courts have treated Democrats and Republicans as though they were established in the Constitution.

Robert Campbell

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There are institutional reasons for this as well.

Yes indeed. Plus money as well.

I don't think the general voter preference for the two parties has anything to do with "vote the lesser of two evils." The 3rd parties we have are not considered superior but unlikely to win. They are, in fact, regarded as fringe parties with a loopy ideas and bad candidates. You cannot project onto most voters an attitude they don't claim to possess.

If we are talking about general voters. Yes certainly. I'm not sure if the green party could be described as fringe though.

I would also note that Ron Paul got where he is now by always voting on principle. It seems that particular principle is very different from the one TOS is advocating for. While he did not become the nominee he did achive a lot in terms of shifting the questions to the points that are the most important. The FED, the debt, spending, govenrment intervention etc... Why do you think Paul Ryan became the VP nominee? Romney wants to get the liberty voters and activists with someone who advocates free markets but won't vote on principle. So voting on a very straightforward principle is despite all odds a viably political strategy.

Edited by Dániel Boros
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It is because of the "vote the lesser of two evils" mentality that the U.S. has a two party system. If everyone follows the herd there will be no third party candidates. Of course there will be none, but if a substantial number of people refuse to vote things may change one day.

So Mr. Poker since you have been using this strategy how much did you win? The strategy isn't working. In Atlas Shrugged the capitalists supported big government by simply doing what they do best. Making stuff, yet the people who would rather go to Galt's Atlantis seem to be always wrong.

The U.S. has a two party system because individualism is written into our constitution. We vote for particular persons to be specific office holders, not collectives such as in a European parliamentary system where the seats up for election are often divided proportionally among the political parties according to their share of the vote. Because in America whole persons are the winners of elections and take office, the system is winner-take-all. Winner-take-all encourages forming alliances and voting blocs behind the most popular candidates, because if your guy loses you are simply aced out of the system completely until the next election.

Two candidates that are similar can divide a vote share between them that allow a poor candidate to win. That is how Clinton won both of his presidential elections, he had Reform Party candidate and billionaire Ross Perot sucking up just enough votes from the Republican side to enable Clinton win a plurality, but Clinton never had a majority of the popular vote.

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I would also note that Ron Paul got where he is now by always voting on principle.

Actually Ron Paul helps to illustrate my point. Voters think of him as a fringe candidate with horrible foreign policy and that's a clear losing strategy at a time when his pacifism/isolationism would jeopardize the country's security.

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I think that is the cause of the kind of group mentality I spoke of but not necessarily the reason why a third party never gets in. Jefferson was the first to form a "party" so it is indeed a very old tradition, but I don't think that the average voter is just as much aware of the facts as you are. The notion that other parties can't ever win has been embedded into the psyche of most Americans.

Actually Ron Paul helps to illustrate my point. Voters think of him as a fringe candidate with horrible foreign policy and that's a clear losing strategy at a time when his pacifism/isolationism would jeopardize the country's security.

Fact is he is not a pacifist nor is he a isolationist, but I do agree the media sold that idea well to the public.

Jeopardize the country's security? Which country are you referring to if I may ask? The one with more guns than anyone else, or are we talking about South Korea, Japan or maybe Germany perhaps?

Also as far as I can tell most Americans are already tired of the wars, but please correct me if I am wrong.

When Obama said last election "I will bring back the troops, you can take that to the bank" was he going for the fringe vote?

Edited by Dániel Boros
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I am not going get involved in that dispute to ascertain who was right.

Grames,

You claimed that anyone who refers to Diana Hsieh as "Comrade Sonia" is not interested in the merits of her charges against various "false friends of Objectivism."

Indeed, that anyone who does so is trying to silence those who believe that she was correct in one or another of her denunciations.

I provided a link to a detailed counterargument against your claim.

In response, you do not rebut anything that I said.

You do not defend any of Dr. Hsieh’s denunciations.

Instead, you announce your refusal to consider any of what I have said on the merits. It’s all hopelessly nonobjective, according to you. You rumble on about how unspecified persons who post in unspecified ways that are displeasing to yourself should be run from this site.

I take it, then, that it does not matter that Dr. Hsieh made a blanket statement, in public, to the effect that nothing published in the Journal of Ayn Rand Studies has ever been better than mediocre. In public, she never cited a single specific failing of a single specific article. Yet she meant her dictum to be taken as a sufficient reason for no true Objectivist to ever have anything whatsoever to do with the Journal of Ayn Rand Studies.

It doesn't matter that Dr. Hsieh published a chapter in a book edited by Chris Sciabarra, and later, in public, denounced both the book and her own chapter—without ever saying what was actually wrong with her chapter.

And so on.

If what I wrote, concerning Dr. Hsieh and her allegations concerning a supposed “false friend of Objectivism” named Chris Sciabarra, is all hopelessly nonobjective, what then of your assertion that anyone who refers to Dr. Hsieh as “Comrade Sonia” is merely trying to silence anyone who takes her charges seriously?

Was that an instance of objectivity prevailing?

Robert Campbell

Edited by Robert Campbell
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I like it better here, even that means having to do without the participation of some of the bittervets at OL.

For some reason, those aligned with Leonard Peikoff and the Ayn Rand Institute are inclined to describe their opponents as "bitter."

A classic example is Allan Gotthelf's putdown (in On Ayn Rand) of Barbara Branden's biography (which he refused to refer to by title) as a product of "embitterment." (Embitterment, he further seems to have thought, was sufficient reason not to refute a single statement made within it.)

This has never made a whole lot of sense.

Several of the principals at the Ayn Rand Institute are veterans of multiple struggles to enhance or preserve their authority in Rand-land.

The ARI community looks up to a 78-year-old man who gained his present position through Ayn Rand’s expulsions of Nathaniel and Barbara Branden, the departure of Alan Blumenthal, and Rand’s final expulsion of Robert Hessen. Who has since retained his authority in part through his own expulsions of David Kelley, George Reisman and Edith Packer, his slapdown of Allan Gotthelf, and, most recently, his expulsion of John McCaskey.

This same man, after 44 years of such struggles, is still carrying around unhealed wounds from his loss of an academic position, nearly 30 years ago, and failure to find any other.

When Grames starts referring to Leonard Peikoff as a “bittervet,” I’ll take that appellation seriously as applied to others.

Robert Campbell

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Double double negative overload.

I, err, did that on purpose.

Of course there will be none, but if a substantial number of people refuse to vote things may change one day.

So Mr. Poker since you have been using this strategy how much did you win? The strategy isn't working.

Lots of people don't vote. In 2008 < 55% of the population voted in the election. What good has that done?

I think the better question is 'what do you have to gain by voting for a libertarian candidate?' It's really unfortunate, but the answer is 'nothing tangible,' as you will see in November. It's best summed up in this AR quote: "The right to vote is a consequence, not a primary cause, of a free social system." I didn't really put two and two together, but that's why Oist intellectuals always say that voting is not a good way to affect change- philosophy is really the primary cause she was talking about, isn't it? Our error is switching 'consequence' with 'primary cause' in AR's sentence.

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I take it, then, that it does not matter that Dr. Hsieh made a blanket statement, in public, to the effect that nothing published in the Journal of Ayn Rand Studies has ever been better than mediocre. In public, she never cited a single specific failing of a single specific article. Yet she meant her dictum to be taken as a sufficient reason for no true Objectivist to ever have anything whatsoever to do with the Journal of Ayn Rand Studies.

It doesn't matter that Dr. Hsieh published a chapter in a book edited by Chris Sciabarra, and later, in public, denounced both the book and her own chapter—without ever saying what was actually wrong with her chapter.

Ok, let me be fair. Diana Hsieh's claims are just as non-objective from the perspective of uninvolved third party's. There is no reason for me or anyone believe she was correct in any of her denunciations without taking her word at face value on points that ought to be supported with evidence. A brief response pointing out her lack of support for her allegations and letting the record speak for itself is all the response merited. Gleefully participating in the tit-for-tat name calling is stupid, and utterly unprofessional of everyone involved. Robert Bidinotto called her a "guttersnipe", whatever the hell that is. He doesn't have a PhD, apparently something as sophisticated as 'Comrade Sonia' was out of his grasp.

Is it too much to ask for everyone to grow the hell up?

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