# Ayn Rand - liberal or conservative? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 15, 2012, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639 "2012-01-15T22:50:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Linden\_Arden](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/53a042/32.png) [@Linden\_Arden](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Linden_Arden)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2012, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/1 "2012-01-15T22:50:22Z")
I am a capitalist like Rand. Capitalism is the most efficient way of allocating resources as long as sufficient regulations are in place. Rand herself likened Libertarians to anarchists and fought them and their lawless philosophy. I find it very odd that conservatives glom onto her. Rand hated conservatives as much as she hated communists. She called Reagan an “enemy of freedom”. So today Rand would be like George Soros - a capitalist who fights the far right. Any objections? ---
**Author:** ![mr.jp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/48db29/32.png) [@mr.jp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mr.jp)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2012, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/2 "2012-01-15T23:06:39Z")
Where did she liken libertarians to anarchists? Since you associate them with “lawless”, it sounds to me like anarcho-capitalists, and not libertarians as it is usually used. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2012, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/3 "2012-01-15T23:06:59Z")
Neither. She would be an Objectivist, which is pretty darn close to being a Libertarian, even if she would never admit it. > [@mr. jp](#): > > Where did she liken libertarians to anarchists? I think the early days of the Libertarian Party saw it attract it’s fair share of “hippy anarchists who just wanted to smoke pot”. But I doubt she’d be too keen on the LP today, either, since she demanded absolute purity and wasn’t too keen on sharing the limelight with another group. ---
**Author:** ![Linden\_Arden](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/53a042/32.png) [@Linden\_Arden](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Linden_Arden)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2012, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/4 "2012-01-15T23:18:33Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Neither. She would be an Objectivist, which is pretty darn close to being a Libertarian, even if she would never admit it. > > I think the early days of the Libertarian Party saw it attract it’s fair share of “hippy anarchists who just wanted to smoke pot”. > > But I doubt she’d be too keen on the LP today, either, since she demanded absolute purity and wasn’t too keen on sharing the limelight with another group. But Rand herself admits Objectivism is a form of Existentialism - which is Liberalism all the way. She breaks from tradition (Conservatism) in other words. Nevertheless I will look up her views on Open Society - of which I am a proponent. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2012, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/5 "2012-01-15T23:25:45Z")
> [@Linden\_Arden](#): > > But Rand herself admits Objectivism is a form of Existentialism - which is Liberalism all the way. “Liberalism” in the 19th century sense of the term. Not the way it is used in the US today. And I don’t believe she thought Objectivism is a form or Existentialism. She may have admired Nietzsche when she was younger, but she disagreed with his philosophy. > [@](#): > > She breaks from tradition (Conservatism) in other words. She didn’t like the shift of conservatives towards the Religious Right, that’s for sure. Not sure about “traditional conservatism”, though. She was definitely pro-choice, which puts her at odds with most conservatives today. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2012, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/6 "2012-01-16T00:19:15Z")
That’s the thing - some of the precious “values” that conservatives wish to conserve, Rand would consider irrational nonsense just as much as some of the liberals’ ideas of fixing society to make it “more just”. American Conservatives of c. 2000 tend to favor her more than American Liberals of c. 2000 because both have interpreted her to be saying: “make your profit and f\*&^ everyone else, you owe them nothing”. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/7 "2012-01-17T04:20:29Z")
What she was, was an evil sociopath. I don’t see the need to associate that with any particular political ideology. ---
**Author:** ![Mosier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ea924/32.png) [@Mosier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mosier)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/8 "2012-01-17T04:26:03Z")
She didn’t dislike Libertarians for their politics. She disliked them because she wanted to be the center of her own cult, and Libertarians were encroaching on her turf. There isn’t a Libertarian out there who sees a distinction between Objectivism and Libertarian ideology, except for Rand’s insistence that one wasn’t the other. She never was able to adequately describe the difference, though. ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 4:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/9 "2012-01-17T04:53:07Z")
Rand had problems with both conservatism and liberalism. To paraphrase, “One wants to control the body, the other the mind.” I know Rand gets a bad rap on these boards, but it would do people and society well to follow her advice and act in one’s “enlightened self interest”. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/10 "2012-01-17T07:30:39Z")
The Pope? Baptist or Catholic? Bears? Shit in the woods or in the trees? ---
**Author:** ![Untoward\_Parable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/51bf81/32.png) [@Untoward\_Parable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Untoward_Parable)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 7:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/11 "2012-01-17T07:34:48Z")
how about just pure sociopath in the pop culture sense, politics have more facets than just liberal/conservative anyway. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 8:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/12 "2012-01-17T08:03:33Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > What she was, was an evil sociopath. I don’t see the need to associate that with any particular political ideology. This. There’s a point at which one stops caring and starts looking for potential help. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 8:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/13 "2012-01-17T08:17:47Z")
> [@Mosier](#): > > There isn’t a Libertarian out there who sees a distinction between Objectivism and Libertarian ideology, except for Rand’s insistence that one wasn’t the other. She never was able to adequately describe the difference, though. As best I could tell from what she wrote, the key to it is that she had developed a framework of belief and morality, and by learning that, you could make benevolent and useful decisions. Libertarians, regardless of whether they wanted many of the same things or not, basically did it out of self-desire, with no morality or logic behind it. Ayn Rand was closer to Jesus or Confucius than to say Paul Krugman or Ron Paul. Personally, I think that anyone who expects people to somehow become better and more moral beings - regardless of what moral system it is you preach - is deluded. People are going to act like people, regardless of what book you put before them. But I’ll grant that Objectivism isn’t Libertarianism. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/14 "2012-01-17T15:15:23Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > Rand had problems with both conservatism and liberalism. To paraphrase, “One wants to control the body, the other the mind.” > > I know Rand gets a bad rap on these boards, but it would do people and society well to follow her advice and act in one’s “enlightened self interest”. Yeah without the enlightened part. Ayn Rand was a nutjob who viewed the entire world through the lens of a poor little rich girl who had everything taken away by the communists. ---
**Author:** ![erislover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/71e660/32.png) [@erislover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erislover)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/15 "2012-01-17T15:32:02Z")
> [@Linden\_Arden](#): > > I am a capitalist like Rand. Capitalism is the most efficient way of allocating resources as long as sufficient regulations are in place. The problem is Rand was _not_ concerned with efficiency arguments. Rand was a capitalist because she saw capitalism as _moral_. A lot of self-styled libertarians are the same. They like to appeal to efficiency arguments because it is convenient and sounds nice but when the same math that proves efficiency proves something like the neutrality of one-time transfers, Randistas are put off and would never consider such a thing as neutral. First and foremost her position on capitalism is moral. It had nothing to do with economic theory. You can look at monopoly rents and taxes as the same thing to the consumer. They carry a deadweight loss. But to Randistas, and others, there is a real _moral_ difference between the tax man and the monopolist, and the monopolist is ok—and then there’s some backpedaling because really there are no monopolies anyway, and even if there were they’d be short-lived, and if they weren’t well it’s just moral to let them be monopolists. > [@](#): > > Rand herself likened Libertarians to anarchists and fought them and their lawless philosophy. She did have a rather dismal view of libertarianism. > [@](#): > > So today Rand would be like George Soros - a capitalist who fights the far right. I doubt it. Rand liked Rand. She also liked those who liked Rand. ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/16 "2012-01-17T15:40:07Z")
Maybe I once thought that the collective “we” shouldn’t hold back the few who were really talended and driven, since they’d rise like tent posts and draw up the ceiling for all of us, instead of everyone forced to crawl under the same carpet. But then I went to a few karaoke parties. You’ve been to that party where they have a karaoke machine set up? You’re not the greatest singer, but it looks like fun and maybe you’ll try it. But there’s always one guy there who’s really into it, and he’s a pretty good singer, too. Why would you insist he stop just so you can make an ass of yourself? And anyway, you didn’t come to a party looking for conflict, so you let him sing. You gravitate out to the kitchen or the porch and talk to people on the periphery of the party. later, you look back into where the party used to be, and he’s still there all by himself, happily yapping along to the video screen. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/17 "2012-01-17T15:48:22Z")
> [@Linden\_Arden](#): > > I find it very odd that conservatives glom onto her. Rand hated conservatives as much as she hated communists. She called Reagan an “enemy of freedom”. Because conservatives and capitalists (professional or ideological) understand pefectly well what you should learn, that Rand’s message can actually help them without actually threatening them. ---
**Author:** ![SuaSponte](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/67e7ee/32.png) [@SuaSponte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SuaSponte)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/18 "2012-01-17T16:09:03Z")
Rand is neither a liberal or conservative in the modern American sense because “liberalism” and “conservatism” in America have no internal consistency. There is no ideological connection between light/no business regulation and opposition to same-sex marriage, and vice versa. Parts of Rand’s philosophy are perfectly in tune with the platform of the Democratic Party, parts are perfectly in tune with the GOP, and parts are just whack. Sua ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/19 "2012-01-17T16:21:36Z")
> [@SuaSponte](#): > > Rand is neither a liberal or conservative in the modern American sense because “liberalism” and “conservatism” in America have no internal consistency. There is no ideological connection between light/no business regulation and opposition to same-sex marriage, and vice versa. > > Parts of Rand’s philosophy are perfectly in tune with the platform of the Democratic Party, parts are perfectly in tune with the GOP, and parts are just whack. > > Sua Welcome back! ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639/20 "2012-01-17T18:09:08Z")
> [@mr.jp](#): > > Where did she liken libertarians to anarchists? Since you associate them with “lawless”, it sounds to me like anarcho-capitalists, and not libertarians as it is usually used. [Ayn Rands Q&A on Libertarianism](http://www.aynrand.org/site/PageServer?pagename=education_campus_libertarians) > [@](#): > > Q: What do you think of the Libertarian movement? [FHF: “The Moratorium on Brains,” 1971] > > AR: All kinds of people today call themselves “libertarians,” especially something calling itself the New Right, which consists of hippies, except that they’re anarchists instead of collectivists. But of course, anarchists are collectivists. Capitalism is the one system that requires absolute objective law, yet they want to combine capitalism and anarchism. That is worse than anything the New Left has proposed. It’s a mockery of philosophy and ideology. They sling slogans and try to ride on two bandwagons. They want to be hippies, but don’t want to preach collectivism, because those jobs are already taken. But anarchism is a logical outgrowth of the anti-intellectual side of collectivism. I could deal with a Marxist with a greater chance of reaching some kind of understanding, and with much greater respect. The anarchist is the scum of the intellectual world of the left, which has given them up. So the right picks up another leftist discard. That’s the Libertarian movement. > > Q: Libertarians advocate the politics you advocate. So why are you opposed to the Libertarian Party? [FHF: “Egalitarianism and Inflation,” 1974] > > AR:They are not defenders of capitalism. They’re a group of publicity seekers who rush into politics prematurely, because they allegedly want to educate people through a political campaign, which can’t be done. Further, their leadership consists of men of every of persuasion, from religious conservatives to anarchists. Moreover, most of them are my enemies: they spend their time denouncing me, while plagiarizing my ideas. Now, I think it’s a bad beginning for an allegedly pro-capitalist party to start by stealing ideas. > > Q: Have you ever heard of [Libertarian presidential candidate] Roger MacBride? [FHF: “?” 1976] > > AR: My answer should be, “I haven’t.” There’s nothing to hear. I have been maintaining in everything I have said and written, that the trouble in the world today is philosophical; that only the right philosophy can save us. Now here is a party that plagiarizes some of my ideas, mixes it with the exact opposite—with religionists, anarchists, and just about every intellectual misfit and scum they can find—and they call themselves Libertarians, and run for office. I dislike Reagan and Carter; I’m not too enthusiastic about the other candidates. But the worst of them are giants compared to anybody who would attempt something as un-philosophical, low, and pragmatic as the Libertarian Party. It is the last insult to ideas and philosophical consistency. And my favorite on her view of Libertarians: > [@](#): > > Q: Why don’t you approve of the Libertarians, thousands of whom are loyal readers of your works? [FHF: “The Age of Mediocrity,” 1981] > > AR:\*\* Because Libertarians are a monstrous, disgusting bunch of people\*\*: they plagiarize my ideas when that fits their purpose, and they denounce me in a more vicious manner than any communist publication, when that fits their purpose. **They are lower than any pragmatists, and what they hold against Objectivism is morality. They’d like to have an amoral political program.** > [@John\_Mace](#): > > I think the early days of the Libertarian Party saw it attract it’s fair share of “hippy anarchists who just wanted to smoke pot”. I think she used the word ‘hippie’ as a more generic insult and anarchism as a form of collectivism than anything to do with pot somkers, see the first Q&A in this post. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ayn-rand-liberal-or-conservative/609639.md?page=2)