I think so. I don’t believe their ideas can be recounciled with the ideas of the religious right. As a Christian I find their ideas repugnant, though I don’t necessarily represent the right very well right now.
Below I layout what I think are the core of Randianism, and why I and Christians would find it objectionable.
First,f rom a comment on the Modelled Behavior Blog: Randianism in a nutshell.
Apex
‘’Thus, I see our proper mission as easing pain, where we can, to the extent we can, the best we can.’
Why? What is the point of that? What right does one have to impose that responsibility on others?’
My response in an earlier post was:
I think this is pure Ayn Rand, correct? I’m sure Apex has a very eloquent defense of this, but honestly my gut reaction is I don’t get this at all. I think life acquire most of its meaning from having connections with something larger than yourself, whether that is family, friends, your God, your country or other, and trying to add something good to something beyond yourself…
If life is just trying to pursuing your own wants and needs, then as best I can tell it really is very empty and meaningless in the end, unless you’re meglomanica as I think Ayn Rand was, in the end dying alone and largely alienated from anyone and everyone she ever knew.
The point being: I don’t care for Ayn Rand. I find her worship of selfishness pathetic and sad. It and she by her own unambiguous statement was opposed utterly to the Christina gospel I believe.
That this will be an issue within the Republican right was discussed in an interesting way here.
Have you read many of Renaissance Guy’s posts attempting to reconcile Rand and Christianity. I think he’s set himself up an impossible task, but with a few tweeks he thinks he can do it!
I don’t see how you could possibly miss Rand’s militant atheism. I actually like the idea (in the fountainhead) of ultimately doing something because of your joy in the creative act, and if people like it great. I don’t get the glorification of selfishness. Nor do I see a way to reconcile it and the Gospels.
Rand has a lot of inspirational ideas in her work, which explains why so many people find it so persuasive. But her effort to turn it into an ideology and her embrace of extremist propositions is where she loses it for me. As you no doubt know, it was Adam Smith in “Wealth of Nations” that criticized the rich and powerful, noting they could collude and exploit workers all other things being equal. (In fact, I think a lot of Smith’s adherents haven’t ever looked at his writings!) Rand’s error is one typical of 20th Century thinkers, trying to take what are often good ideas and then turn them into a closed ideological system with more dogma than common sense.
I think this Erb fellow has nailed it re Rand’s limitations. But I dunno much about a Randian being a skunk, as a practical matter, at Tea Parties. In my experience, folks are at a Tea Party b/c they want to talk about economic liberty, not religion, with the exception of prolife issues maybe. But right now, atheist libertarian types have more in common with prolife religious conservatives than you think. We are to the point where other things which we do agree on must be addressed first. I think that is why the Tea Party as a concept has risen, while the “Religious Right” as a concept is fading, and rather quaintly 1980’s.
cheers
Linda
Thanks for visiting again Linda. Visit Scott’s blog. You likely won’t agree with a lot he says, but you get something from it I think.