In 1936 Ayn Rand's We the Living was published, and the individual was present as sacred, never to be violated. In 1937 Ayn Rand's Anthem was published, and man became Man, a being worthy of the title. In 1943, Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead was published, and Man left the cross and stood on a pedestal. And in 1957 Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged was published, and Man escaped the tyranny of altruism and entered the realm of Atlantis. With these novels, Ayn Rand developed and created Man as a being of volition capable of living life on earth with prosperity, peace, creativity, and achievement. For this, she is hated, despised, ridiculed, and rejected. But the question remains: Is Man a self-made being, or a fickle fleck of flotsam fooling himself with visions of virousity when in reality he's just a nasty virulent vitriolic viper that needs to be saved by sacrificing the best to the worst. In other words, is the future of Man on the cross or the pedestal? Or, if you prefer, will Ayn Rand's Objectivism replace Christianity as the dominant force in American culture. Ayn Rand: "This view of man has rarely been expressed in human history. Today, it is virtually non-existent. Yet this is the view with which—in various degrees of longing, wistfulness, passion and agonized confusion—the best of mankind’s youth start out in life. It is not even a view, for most of them, but a foggy, groping, undefined sense made of raw pain and incommunicable happiness. It is a sense of enormous expectation, the sense that one’s life is important, that great achievements are within one’s capacity, and that great things lie ahead. It is not in the nature of man—nor of any living entity—to start out by giving up, by spitting in one’s own face and damning existence; that requires a process of corruption, whose rapidity differs from man to man. Some give up at the first touch of pressure; some sell out; some run down by imperceptible degrees and lose their fire, never knowing when or how they lost it. Then all of these vanish in the vast swamp of their elders who tell them persistently that maturity consists of abandoning one’s mind; security, of abandoning one’s values; practicality, of losing self-esteem. Yet a few hold on and move on, knowing that that fire is not to be betrayed, learning how to give it shape, purpose and reality. But whatever their future, at the dawn of their lives, men seek a noble vision of man’s nature and of life’s potential." What say you? The pedestal or the cross? Me? I'd say that's for each individual to determine. However, Ayn Rand once wrote that the future belongs to those building it today...and I ain't on no cross.
The pedestal is coming...... but there will be some pretty significant conflict first. I do hope that the conflict can be worked out metaphorically........ rather than literally. https://www.near-death.com/experiences/notable/howard-storm.html#a04
Cattle raising calves. This not the future I want, nor fight for. I fight for a world were man is free to live, love, laugh, and die knowing he gave his best to reach his best to live the life he earned, be it an ordinary worker at home with his children laughing and playing in the backyard, or a creative genius making love to the soul of their choice on highest floor of the tallest skyscraper. We are not God’s chattel; we are beings of reason.
Objectivism has been completely debunked as an unattainable ideology. It just doesn't work in the real world.
