Don't read "Atlas Shrugged"!

MrJoshua wrote: WTH is going on in this thread? I keep seeing the dismissal of Rand's ideals because humans are flawed. So what if we are flawed. Do we assume we cannot succeed thus encourage and teach failure? No. We try to be the best we can and keep trying to be better. Trying to run a country by encouraging those around us to be the best they can is not a flawed system. Trying to run a country by saying everyone is an incapable moron is a sure fire way to run the country into the ground.

The best I heard so far was the statement that here philosophy can work well on a personal level. But that it is too idealistic to attempt to enact on a societal level.

For my part, I believe a healthy society needs to allow for all stripes. When you start giving primacy to a single philosophy, it will slide into totalitarianism.

I don't think her philosophies are bad, I just don't think they're the Best or the Only.

I'm still trying to figure out why Libertarians claim similarities while Rand unilaterally dismissed Libertarianism.

There are political similarities. But Rand's viewpoints are significantly more all encompassing, and there is a wide divergence the minute they leave the political arena.

I think there are a lot more Libertarians on this board than there are Objectivists (or Randists, as Mike Wallace said )

Libertarians claim similarities to Objectivism because we all basically believe that each individual's rights are supreme, and we should be free of OUTSIDE obligations we do not choose to accept and free of outside restrictions on our personal lives (so long as we do not impinge on another individual's rights).

Rand disapproved of Libertarians because Libertarians think it is OK to be a slacker or a druggie or a religious fanatic, as long as you bear the cost and consequences of those choices. Rand thought that Libertarianism allowed non-rational lifestyles, which are therefore non-Objectivist.