1. Craig Biddle and his Objectivist Standard Institute (“OSI”) filed a lawsuit against multi-millionaire Objectivist donor Carl Barney and his related Objectivist organizations. According to the lawsuit, Barney provided Biddle and the OSI several million dollars (essentially as a gift) to spread Objectivism. However, Biddle and Barney’s personal relationship broke down, and Barney then impermissibly tried to place restrictions on the funds. Barney has counterclaimed, alleging that Biddle has lied to and defrauded him for at least a decade. Not only that, but Biddle allegedly admitted to Barney’s face that he was never sincere. It’s hard to draw conclusions from initial legal pleadings, but it looks like Barney has a huge case of buyer’s remorse.
2. The Ayn Rand Institute continues its anti-Trump and anti-ICE bent. In fact, it seems to be the main interest of the ARI and its writers. For example, the six most recent New Ideal articles are the Supreme Court’s tariff decision (a blow against Trump’s “authoritarianism”), Ayn Rand’s life as an immigrant (two articles), “ICE tyranny,” Trump and political violence, and “ICE and the Rule of Men.” ARI associated writers are even harsher with comparisons of Trump to Hitler and ICE to the Nazis. Rand of course didn’t opine on Trump and never published anything on immigration (although her one public comment seems supportive of large-scale immigration). As I’ve said before, to some extent the ARI’s commenting on Trump and issues such as immigration is inevitable. An Ayn Rand Institute that comments only on her philosophy and political and cultural topics Rand opined upon wouldn’t be particularly interesting. On the other hand, why doesn’t the ARI ever comment on transgenderism? One could make a reasonable conclusion of what Rand would have thought about transgenderism given her attitude toward homosexuality and male/female roles (which unlike immigration made it into print). And even on immigration one could surmise that Rand would support a restrictive (even group based) immigration policy given her views on certain cultures (which borders on the racist).*
* Likewise, in Ayn Rand Answers (if you can trust Robert Mayhew’s editing), Rand said Arabs were practically “savages” and “nomads” and Palestinians had lost all their rights.
-Neil Parille
About #1: ARI Watch has an article providing the high points of each “complaint” (initial pleading that starts a lawsuit). Though the suits do not involve the Ayn Rand Institute, both parties were once associated with it.
ReplyDeleteThe Rupture of Biddle and Barney
Never forget that Carl Barney was involved with Scientology as a Missionholder in Los Angeles and San Diego in the 1970s. He ran a loan business alongside the missions (combination bookstores and lower-level training facilities) which was a scam. L. Ron Hubbard or the Church organization found out and Barney was ousted out of his position, with the missions returning to Church control.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.xenu.net/archive/personal_story/cheryl_s/cheryl02a.html <== This URL leads to a website of a former Scientology staff member who joined Scientology through the Barney missions.
I'm one of those "oh my god, what was I thinking?!?" recent escapees from Objectivism, only it took me almost 40 years. There are real-life reasons why it took me that long, and I won't bore anyone with the details. But this site has been instrumental in helping me identify exactly what it was about Objectivism that really started to bother me.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, that said, I just want to point out one area of apparent disagreement with some of what I read here. This site seems to be very anti-ARI, which I understand completely. But for various reasons, I'm just as anti-TAS as I am anti-ARI. The current pro-Trump/anti-Trump schism makes a lot of sense to me, now that I've identified how Rand's thinking would lead to the thinking of the Objectivists on both sides of that particular schism.
I won't delve into my reasons for being vehemently anti-Trump and anti-ICE. Instead, I'll just suggest that if you haven't already, you should follow along with the various administration social media accounts. Focus on the Department of Homeland Security account, and then the Department of Labor account. I can't seem to insert screenshots here, but I'll list just two examples of posts from DHS:
1. They posted an image of Uncle Sam standing next to a signpost with various terms. They captioned the image, "Which way, American man?" If you're not aware, there's a book by now-deceased virulent white nationalist William Gayley Simpson titled "Which Way Western Man?" The terms on the signpost fit nicely with the (predicable) themes of the book. I don't think it's remotely a possibility that the caption and the book's title was coincidental.
2. They posted a painting of an idyllic scene of a beach with a 1950s convertible parked year it (which they stole), captioned "The peace of a nation no longer besieged by the third world." Embedded in the image was the text, "America After 100 Million Deportations." For this administration, "the third world" is code for non-white people, and of course, you could never "deport" 100 million people without removing 50+ million citizens and millions of legal residents.
My point is that I don't think you can evaluate ICE in isolation from the very obvious white Christian nationalist influences in this administration. You can't ignore that Stephen Miller, who has a history of supporting white nationalist causes, is the architect of Trump's "mass deportation." I don't think you can ignore those influences when thinking about immigration today.
So, that's it. I just wanted to throw that out there as food for thought. But thanks for all of the work in identifying those things in Rand and her ideas that are so very, very bad.