Ayn Rand is dead. Liberals will miss her.

[starlord]

Interesting article I saw the other day.
Excerpts:

Now Rand is on the shelf, gathering dust with F.A. Hayek, Edmund Burke and other once-prominent conservative luminaries. It’s no longer possible to provoke the elders by going on about John Galt. Indeed, many of the elders have by now used Randian references to name their yachts, investment companies and foundations.

Instead, young insurgent conservatives talk about “race realism ,” argue that manipulated crime statistics mask growing social disorder and cast feminism as a plot against men. Instead of reading Rand, they take the “red pill”, indulging in an emergent internet counter-culture that reveals the principles of liberalism — rights, equality, tolerance — to be dangerous myths. Beyond Breitbart.com, ideological energy on the right now courses through tiny blogs and websites of the Dark Enlightenment, the latter-day equivalent of Rand’s Objectivist Newsletter and the many libertarian ’zines she inspired.

Once upon a time, professors tut-tutted when Rand spoke to overflow crowds on college campuses, where she lambasted left and right alike and claimed, improbably, that big business was America’s persecuted minority. She delighted in skewering liberal audience members and occasionally turned her scorn on questioners. But this was soft stuff compared with the insults handed out by Milo Yiannopoulos and the uproar that has greeted his appearances. Rand may have accused liberals of having a “lust for power,” but she never would have called Holocaust humor a harmless search for “lulz,” as Yiannopoulos gleefully does.

Indeed, the new ideas on the right have moved away from classical liberalism altogether. American conservatives have always had a mixed reaction to the Western philosophical tradition that emphasizes the sanctity of the individual. Religious conservatives, in particular, often struggle with Rand because her extreme embrace of individualism leaves little room for God, country, duty or faith. But Trump represents a victory for a form of conservatism that is openly illiberal and willing to junk entirely the traditional rhetoric of individualism and free markets for nationalism inflected with racism, misogyny and xenophobia.


Mixed in with Rand’s vituperative attacks on government was a defense of the individual’s rights in the face of a powerful state. This single-minded focus could yield surprising alignments, such as Rand’s opposition to drug laws and her support of legal abortion. And although liberals have always loved to hate her, over the next four years, they may come to miss her defense of individual autonomy and liberty. Ayn Rand is dead. Long live Ayn Rand!

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.was...g-to-miss-her/

TL;DR
the young right of today are morphing in a totally (and nearly opposite direction) of their forebears.

Where the old school was all about money and enabling business to screw the public at the cost of... literally anything else, the new school is about authortarian domination of women and minorities.

Where will the vestiges of the Randians go? They were notably against el trumpo early on, but seem to be using him as a distraction to quietly push their ideas in their death throes.
But what exactly is the future of the repubs? To go from anarcho-capitalists (in their most extreme incarnation) to neo-fascists is a big leap.
And where does that leave the dems and the left? Before we could at least reason with the right and use their greed as a leverage. Now... they are devoid of rationality.

So, what is the future of "conservatism" in the US?

[Kujako]

So, what is the future of "conservatism" in the US?

Same as it's been, misinterpreting or just making up what Ayn Rand said to suite whatever agenda they have.

[Puupi]

She died 35 years ago.

[starlord]

She died 35 years ago.

The article is referring to her ideas being dead.

[Garnier Fructis]

She died 35 years ago.

They're not talking about the death of Ayn Rand the person, but about the death of Ayn Rand the philosophy.

[Hisholyness]

Whats with the blasting of the right all of a sudden? Shills being paid to try to distract from the left?

"I was insulting republics before it was cool"...?

[Berengil]

Ayn Rand was about as " conservative " as I am a Satanist. Just because she knelt at the altar of business doesn't automatically make her a conservative. Her disdaining (not just atheism, but outright disgust) of religion, for example, would get her run out of conservative gatherings from about the late 70s on through today. And as you mentioned, she championed personal liberty as an absolute on issues like abortion.

Ayn Rand was the archetypal libertarian.

As for the future of conservatism, who knows? It's in a state of chaos right now, and has yet to settle into a new normative condition. For answers to that question, I summon @Skroe.

[Exedore]

Rand was never what you would consider politically conservative. I don't know why the linked article is associating the two. Her philosophy is far more aligned with libertarians, who have clear disagreements with conservatives. It's just that liberals tend to use government power more, so her philosophy is less hostile to conservatives.

[NED funded]

Its pretty ironic we are reading the death of ayn rand's phylosophy using amp, a clear violation of the NAP.

[PC2]

If her ideas die then we live in a statist or collectivist paradise.

[starlord]

the reason she is asspciated with conservatives is because she was the previous "cool and edgy" philosophy that younger conservatives would follow, before eventually settling into good ol' boy conservatism.

[Celista]

1. Randian philosophy is not dead, if anything Trump administration policies epitomize Randian thought;
2. Conservatives shitting on women and minorities is nothing new.

One day they'll completely weed themselves out of the gene pool with their forever-alone ideology, so who cares.

[Sunseeker]

Ayn was never really any sort of conservative, she was more of an anarcho-capitalist. She makes American Libertarians look like socialists.

In any case though, yes, Ayn Rand and her writings were at the very least, sane, if on the extreme end of the chart. You could argue against them because they held ground to rational political, economic and social ideas. You can't argue against paranoia. Telling a paranoid man they're not out to get him is just proof that you're working for them!

So yes. We will miss the sanity of the Right. But the Right will miss it more.

[Deleted]

Alt right is a direct byproduct of the conservative right polices, not an ideological shift

Despite gaining traction, it is a dying paradigm that will disappear once the free market neoliberal establishment is finally recognized as the root of the problem and eradicated

The alt right won't last, they are on the fringe of a society that has steadily become more tolerant and world-conscious

[starlord]

Conservatives don't care about Rand except when they're pretending to be libertarians and even then it's just empty lip service.

well i think its worth noting that that was/is the driving force behind a lot of their anti-social program and pro business shenanigans.
and even the "new school" sort of uses it, in a very twisted form of social darwinism.

[Rothg]

Ayn Rand was about as " conservative " as I am a Satanist. Just because she knelt at the altar of business doesn't automatically make her a conservative. Her disdaining (not just atheism, but outright disgust) of religion, for example, would get her run out of conservative gatherings from about the late 70s on through today. And as you mentioned, she championed personal liberty as an absolute on issues like abortion.

Ayn Rand was the archetypal libertarian.

As for the future of conservatism, who knows? It's in a state of chaos right now, and has yet to settle into a new normative condition. For answers to that question, I summon @Skroe.

Is Skroe a conservative?

[downnola]

Interesting article I saw the other day.
Excerpts:


https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.was...g-to-miss-her/

TL;DR
the young right of today are morphing in a totally (and nearly opposite direction) of their forebears.

Where the old school was all about money and enabling business to screw the public at the cost of... literally anything else, the new school is about authortarian domination of women and minorities.

Where will the vestiges of the Randians go? They were notably against el trumpo early on, but seem to be using him as a distraction to quietly push their ideas in their death throes.
But what exactly is the future of the repubs? To go from anarcho-capitalists (in their most extreme incarnation) to neo-fascists is a big leap.
And where does that leave the dems and the left? Before we could at least reason with the right and use their greed as a leverage. Now... they are devoid of rationality.

So, what is the future of "conservatism" in the US?

The old school was about growing the economy for the benefit of all, but focused on fattening the wallets of those at the top in the long run. The new school is more of that sentiment but relies on using nationalist populism instead of globalism to convince the masses that crony capitalism benefits them. It won't last long because they're writing checks they can't cash. Nationalism won't bring back jobs and will usher in a wave of more automation and A.I. based production. The question is if the left is smart enough to form a coalition with the moderate right to fix the things Trumpism is bound to break.

[NED funded]

Friedman did a better job at beating young socialists.

[Independent voter]

Conservatives like smaller government which is something Rand would've approved of because a smaller government is less powerful and has less control over the day to day life of the masses.

A lot of conservatives like small government because of lower taxes though.

[Berengil]

Is Skroe a conservative?

He says so. From what he says about his ideas, he strikes me as a "Rockefeller Republican".