- Gender dysphoria is both a real and a dire condition which can be successfully treated through a surgical intervention by which the individual is turned into a kind of replica of the gender he/she identifies with. This treatment is so effective at curing the individual's suffering that it can and should be used on minors. Transgenders are often to brutally treated by society that they deserve to have their medical expenses compensated by the state (i.e., taxpayers) and/or insurance companies.
- Gender dysphoria is likely real and a dire condition, but to "cure" it by surgical intervention is so radical and invasive that only adults should be allowed to make use of it. Minors should not be allowed to transition because it's just too risky. What if they live to regret the irreversible changes inflicted upon them?
- Whether gender dysphoria is real or not is besides the point. Transitioning is just too extreme a cure for the condition. That such procedures should be allowed against children is a scandal. Psychologists who manipulate minors into transitioning and the surgeons who perform the operation deserve prison sentences. Adults, however, because they are adults and hence free and sovereign citizens, should be allowed to transition, but they must bear all their medical expenses and not become a burden on tax payers (or insurance companies).
- Any kind of transitioning or puberty blockers should be illegal, because it's against the laws of God and/or the universe. Gender dysphoria, to the extent that it is real, is a mental illness that needs to be treated with psychology-based interventions, not physical mutilation. Those who transition become perpetual patients (i.e., they need constant medical care and access to hormones), and this means they'll likely become a burden on an already over-burdened medical system.
Sunday, July 07, 2024
Objectivism and Transgenderism
Monday, July 01, 2024
Objectivist Roundup, July 2024
1. Another month and another Kindle Book. The Atlas Society just published Robert Tracisnki’s Pocket Guide to Ayn Rand.
2. The Ayn Rand Fan Club had an interesting discussion of “Social Hierarchies In and Out of Objectivism.” They mention a recent interview with economist Walter Block who was involved in the Objectivist movement in the 1960’s. He confirms the cultish side of Objectivism and says Rand would excommunicate people if she thought they were failing to see the implications of her thought. They also include an interview with up-and-coming Objectivist psychologist Gena Gorlin. Gorlin is asked if she’s read Nathaniel Branden’s The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem (a post-Split book). She says she hasn’t read it or much of Branden. She says he’s a minor figure in psychology and implies his theory of self-esteem is outdated. Certainly, Branden’s exaggerated view of the importance for self-esteem hasn’t held up well in recent research (for example, it’s been shown that criminals have high self-esteem and even commit crime to keep their self-esteem up).
3. The Ayn Rand Institute Press just published a collection of writings by Tara Smith and others called The First Amendment. I enjoyed Smith’s essays and in particular her discussion of religious exemptions to government laws and regulations. Of note is Onkar Ghate’s essay on the “separation of church and state.” As long time readers of the ARCHN Blog know, the First Amendment applied only to the federal government. States could and did support religion in various ways. Ghate doesn’t mention this or even appear to know this. He mentions Thomas Jefferson’s letter to the Danbury Baptist where he coined the phrase. However, in his Second Inaugural Address, Jefferson wrote, “I have therefore undertaken, on no occasion, to prescribe the religious exercises suited to it; but have left them, as the constitution found them, under the direction and discipline of state or church authorities acknowledged by the several religious societies.” And what would an essay on religion be without the Tertullian misquote – “I believe because it's absurd”?
4. The big news this year is that the Ayn Rand Institute is moving from California to Austin, Texas, minutes away from the University of Texas at Austin. The ARI has purchased the land and will construct an Ayn Rand Center and an Ayn Rand University campus. I don’t know if there is a backstory here, other than the ARI’s major donor lives in Austin and the ARI funds some professorships at UT-Austin.Sunday, June 02, 2024
Objectivist Roundup, June 2024
1. The Ayn Rand Fan Club’s Scott Schiff has a way of getting under Yaron Brook’s skin. I thought it was standard Objectivism that philosophers rule the future, but I guess it’s just one guy with a YouTube channel.
2. The Ayn Rand Institute Press just published a collection of essays by Leonard Peikoff entitled Why Act on Principle? Among other works, it contains Peikoff’s October 2001 editorial in the New York Times called “End States Who Sponsor Terrorism” where Peikoff all but calls for the use of nuclear weapons against Saudi Arabia and Iran. He demands a full-scale invasion and years-long occupation of Iran to “de-Nazify” the nation. It also includes 1989’s “Fact and Value,” Peikoff’s excommunication of David Kelley for his advocacy of “Open Objectivism.” Left unmentioned, of course, is that Peikoff’s split with Kelley started when Kelley refused to denounce Barbara Branden’s 1986 biography of Rand. Peikoff insisted at the time that Branden’s report of Rand’s affair with Nathaniel Branden was an arbitrary assertion. I do find it interesting that so much Peikoff material (such as transcripts of his courses) has been published near the end of his life.
3. Frederick Cookinham will be publishing the first volume of a commentary on Atlas Shrugged entitled The Journey of Dagny Taggert. At 476 pages the commentary might well be longer than Atlas.
4. Kirkus Reviews has a brief review of the upcoming biography of Rand. It’s been a while since I read The Fountainhead, but it never occurred to me that Roark was a “new Jew” strengthening the Diaspora.Wednesday, May 01, 2024
Objectivist Round-up, May 2024
1. Former Ayn Rand associate Robert Hessen has died. Chris Sciabarra has a post. For reasons I can’t recall, Hessen and his wife Bea Hessen ended up in Peikoff’s dog house after Rand’s death and they were written out of Objectivist publications.
2. Objectivist philosopher Tara Smith will soon be publishing Egoism Without Permission: The Moral Psychology of Ayn Rand’s Ethics. Although associated with the Ayn Rand Institute, Smith is one the less dogmatic of ARI scholars. ARI Chairman of the Board Yaron Brook interviews Smith. here.Monday, April 08, 2024
Objectivist Round-up, April 2024
Monday, March 04, 2024
Objectivist Roundup, March 2024
Sunday, February 04, 2024
Objectivist Roundup, February 2024
i. Rand was always intense, even when reheating the Borscht her cook made.ii. Binswanger concedes that Rand occasionally got unnecessarily angry at interlocutors because she would judge their motives and premises prematurely.iii. Rand didn't see all the implications of some of her ideas until the 1970s. That was a new one to me.iv. Rand was a great psychologist, including better than many "respected historical psychologists." James Valliant made a similar claim recently.v. Binswanger still hates the Brandens ("villains"). Fair enough from his perspective, but he actually claims Rand's excommunication letter in 1968 (To Whom It May Concern) was measured and even Olympian. It's hard to imagine calling Nathaniel a thief without evidence as being measured. As Nathaniel said in his memoirs, Rand's attack was so "over the top" that people wondered if he was an alcoholic or a child molester.vi. Maybe not a major point, but Binswanger misrepresents Barbara's Branden's biography (The Passion of Ayn Rand) on Rand's final meeting and phone call with Rand. As Binswanger says, Rand and Barbara met in Rand's New York apartment in 1981. According to Barbara, after the meeting, she sent Rand a letter stating that she was writing Rand's biography. When Rand didn't respond, Barbara called her. Rand refused to talk. Barbara says she was certain that this was due to Rand's disapproval of the prospective biography. Binswanger doesn't mention the letter and says Barbara first mentioned the idea of the biography in the phone call and asked for Rand's assistance. He says Barbara claims that this final conversation was of a "I'm sorry that things didn't work out" variety. This was manifestly not what Branden wrote. (The existence of the post-meeting letter mentioning a biography is confirmed by Cynthia Peikoff in 100 Voices). Perhaps Binswanger should have re-read the relevant page in Branden's biography before accusing her of lying.