# Did Ayn Rand idolize a serial killer? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 14, 2011, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323 "2011-04-14T03:01:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/21 "2011-04-14T16:02:50Z")
> [@pbbth](#): > > Wait, I thought Rand felt like what was important was the actions of the individual, and that people are supposed to make choices and experience the outcome of those choices, etc. So how is it that when the problem is a man who needs financial help because he isn’t earning enough to feed himself the problem is his personal lacking, but when a man kills someone and dismembers their corpse and then by trickery takes money from her grieving parent it is society’s fault for not giving him a purpose in life? First of all, remember, when she was writing all this, she was 23, and the Ayn Rand of 1928 wasn’t the same person as the Ayn Rand of 1958. She was still working out her philosophical ideas. But I think what she’s writing in her journal is more that, everyone says what a terrible person Hickman is, but they’re all worse than he is, because they’re all a herd of mindless sheep who condemn Hickman not because of what he did, but because he dares to defy society. ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/22 "2011-04-14T16:06:23Z")
And as I tried to insinuate above, she’d hardly be alone in her fascination with that kind of murderous defiance. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/23 "2011-04-14T16:13:39Z")
[Wiki](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Edward_Hickman) has a very good article on the subject. First of all, the writer of the article apparently doesn’t know how to count or use the dictionary. ONE is not a serial number, and ONE killing doth not a serial killer make. I don’t think there’s ever been a kidnapping-and-demanding-ransom serial killer. ---
**Author:** ![redtail23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/3e96dc/32.png) [@redtail23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/redtail23)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/24 "2011-04-14T16:14:10Z")
> [@Paranoid\_Randroid](#): > > You’re missing something essential about her conception of goodness with regard to goals and behavior. It’s true that, in Rand’s view, a _good_ person regards other individuals as instruments to her own happiness; but such a person also respects the rights of others to pursue _their own_ happiness. That is, she believes in self-ownership applied not only to herself but to every other human. A perfect individual is one who wishes to strive and achieve success due to her own merits. She should find abhorrent the act of cheating or stealing or coercion generally. > > It’s simply not the case that a Randian hero would brutally take the life of a little girl for his own gratification. It says _something_ about Rand that one of the closest real-life expositions of her philosophy was given by a sociopath, agreed. But her position is somewhat more nuanced than to deserve an immediate dismissal. Well, like I said, I’ve not studied Rand. And I’m willing to grant that, in her fantasy world, there are people with all the qualities of a sociopath, but who also respect other people. I just don’t think that combination exists in the real world. If you don’t care about anyone else or what anyone else thinks, there is never any reason to learn to respect other people. Unless you believe that “respect for others” is somehow inherent to the human race, a concept which can easily be disproven by spending a day watching two- and three-year olds. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/25 "2011-04-14T16:17:59Z")
> [@redtail23](#): > > And I’m willing to grant that, in her fantasy world, there are people with all the qualities of a sociopath, but who also respect other people. > > I just don’t think that combination exists in the real world. Actually, most serial killers fixate on a certain type of person. Dahmer killed the gays, many a serial killer targets prostitutes. EvenHitler respected certain groups and killed others. One reason An Rule had such a hard time believing that her friend Ted Bundy was the serial killer she had a contract to write her first book about was how courteously he treated her and the other women he interacted with. All you have to do is convince yourself “those” people deserve to die by your hand. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/26 "2011-04-14T16:18:40Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > [Wiki](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Edward_Hickman) has a very good article on the subject. > > First of all, the writer of the article apparently doesn’t know how to count or use the dictionary. ONE is not a serial number, and ONE killing doth not a serial killer make. I don’t think there’s ever been a kidnapping-and-demanding-ransom serial killer. 😕 Hmm, what?! [Sure there was!](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruthless_People) ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/27 "2011-04-14T16:20:20Z")
> [@Paranoid\_Randroid](#): > > I suppose it’s incumbent upon the lukewarmly sympathetic parties to defend Rand – ah, well. Nope–it’s incumbent upon anyone who wants to prove something to prove it. Or, they could just start a thread they say maybe belongs in GQ with a mealy-mouthed “just throwing it out there” OP, thus making their assertion without imposing on themselves the obligation to prove anything. Which seems quite :rolleyes: to me, but whatever. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/28 "2011-04-14T16:23:51Z")
Rand very often admired - or hated - individuals with blatantly contradictory characteristics, sort of a yin/yang that she recognized in many people, including many of her characters. The woman who tries to destroy the man she worships. The self-made billionaire whose newspaper glorifies mediocrity. The architect who blows up his own creation. The philosopher who becomes a pirate. The industrialist who spends years destroying his own mining company. So it wasn’t unusual for her to admire certain characteristics of a person while condemning them as a whole . . . or condemn certain characteristics while admiring them as a whole. And Rand, herself, was the best example of this kind of duality. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/29 "2011-04-14T16:38:44Z")
I don’t see why this should be surprising. ---
**Author:** ![rogerbox](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/76d3ee/32.png) [@rogerbox](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rogerbox)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/30 "2011-04-14T16:39:29Z")
> [@Paranoid\_Randroid](#): > > You’re missing something essential about her conception of goodness with regard to goals and behavior. It’s true that, in Rand’s view, a _good_ person regards other individuals as instruments to her own happiness; but such a person also respects the rights of others to pursue _their own_ happiness. That is, she believes in self-ownership applied not only to herself but to every other human. A perfect individual is one who wishes to strive and achieve success due to her own merits. She should find abhorrent the act of cheating or stealing or coercion generally. In principal this sounds all well and good and sounds a lot like LeVayan Satanism which I can respect. In practice, Randians and Libertarians don’t care a wit about others’ pursuit of happiness and readily impede others for their own benefit. Randianism and Sociopathy has a very thin, gray, hazy boundary. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/31 "2011-04-14T16:40:54Z")
More from Rand’s journal: > [@](#): > > The first thing that impresses me about the case is the ferocious rage of a whole society against one man. No matter what the man did, there is always something loathsome in the ‘virtuous’ indignation and mass-hatred of the ‘majority.’… It is repulsive to see all these beings with worse sins and crimes in their own lives, virtuously condemning a criminal…" Really? She thought that everybody had done worse things than kidnap, murder and disembowel a 12 year old girl? The fact that she did not understand how the crime itself could bother people is indicative that she herself was a sociopath - not that the entirety of her writing, and her actions in her pesronal life don’t show that as well. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/32 "2011-04-14T16:45:20Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > [Wiki](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Edward_Hickman) has a very good article on the subject. > > First of all, the writer of the article apparently doesn’t know how to count or use the dictionary. ONE is not a serial number, and ONE killing doth not a serial killer make. I don’t think there’s ever been a kidnapping-and-demanding-ransom serial killer. Hickman also confessed to having committed at least one other murder during a hold up. Still technically not a serial killer, but he was at least a _multiple_ murderer. ---
**Author:** ![Paranoid\_Randroid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/paranoid_randroid/32/18_2.png) [@Paranoid\_Randroid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paranoid_Randroid)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/33 "2011-04-14T17:16:00Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > Really? She thought that everybody had done worse things than kidnap, murder and disembowel a 12 year old girl? In the broader context, I think her statements are a bit more defensible (and I mean “a bit” non-facetiously) than that. Immediately following your quotation, she writes: > [@Ayn Rand](#): > > This is not just the case of a terrible crime. It is not the crime alone that has raised that fury of public hatred. It is the case of a daring challenge to society. It is the fact that a crime has been committed by one man, alone; that this man knew it was against all the laws of humanity and intended it that way; that he does not want to recognize it as a crime and that he feels superior to all. […] > > A mob’s feeling of omnipotence is its most jealously guarded possession and therefore a dangerous thing to wound. The mob can forgive a criminal who erred, but who is just one of itself, i.e., has the same soul and ideas and bends to the same gods. But to see a man who has freed himself from it entirely, who has nothing in common with it, a man who does not need it and who openly disdains it—this is the one crime a mob can never forgive. Thus one possible defense: In Rand’s view, the “mob” wasn’t condemning the right thing; it didn’t work itself into a furor so much over the _killing_ but rather Hickman’s explicit rejection of the mob’s authority. (In fact, she appears to have believed that they would hardly have cared otherwise.) So the mob’s “sins and crimes” are meant to be compared, not to murder, but to this rejection. You may not buy that but it’s one interpretation, and clearly she saw this conflict through the lens of collectivism-vs-individualism. > [@](#): > > The fact that she did not understand how the crime itself could bother people This, on the other hand, is very much not true, and I don’t think that’s up to interpretation. She _was not_ condoning murder; she never claimed to not understand why the act of murder bothered people. She genuinely seems to have thought that the negative reaction was not to his crimes but to his stated philosophy. That is what she condemned. > [@](#): > > is indicative that she herself was a sociopath - not that the entirety of her writing, and her actions in her pesronal life don’t show that as well. But I agree, she was a bit of a sociopath. ---
**Author:** ![redtail23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/3e96dc/32.png) [@redtail23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/redtail23)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/34 "2011-04-14T18:03:43Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > Actually, most serial killers fixate on a certain type of person. Dahmer killed the gays, many a serial killer targets prostitutes. EvenHitler respected certain groups and killed others. One reason An Rule had such a hard time believing that her friend Ted Bundy was the serial killer she had a contract to write her first book about was how courteously he treated her and the other women he interacted with. > > All you have to do is convince yourself “those” people deserve to die by your hand. May be, I’m certainly no expert. But every description I’ve read of sociopaths includes discussion of how utterly charming they can be when they want to. It’s not that they actually care about anyone, it’s just that they’ve learned how to manipulate people. If they don’t think they’ll be caught, or the benefit of being considered charming no longer outweighs the detriments, or they think they can get away with it for whatever reason, all of that charm disappears. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/35 "2011-04-14T18:17:03Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > [Wiki](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Edward_Hickman) has a very good article on the subject. > > First of all, the writer of the article apparently doesn’t know how to count or use the dictionary. ONE is not a serial number, and ONE killing doth not a serial killer make. I don’t think there’s ever been a kidnapping-and-demanding-ransom serial killer. From the first article: Along the way it’s believed he strangled a girl in Milwaukee, and killed his crime partner’s grandfather in Pasadena, tossing his body over a bridge after taking his money. Plus Dio’s hold up (if that isn’t the grandfather), that would be four. Assuming he did commit these other crimes, maybe, maybe not. Is four enough for a serial killer? And given that he was arrested at 19, IF he killed four people, he seems to be a high achiever. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/36 "2011-04-14T18:21:09Z")
I’m not posting much in here, but I want to let folks know that I’m reading with interest, especially folks with Rand in your names–the one because you’ve got seriously useful input that helps me understand Ayn Rand much better than these articles did, and the other because your contempt is a badge of honor. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/37 "2011-04-14T19:04:06Z")
Probably fantacizing about jumping his nimble young bones. She was a skanky old cougar. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/38 "2011-04-14T19:11:37Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > Probably fantacizing about jumping his nimble young bones. She was a skanky old cougar. At the time, she was 23, and Hickman, when he was hanged, was 20. 3 years does not a cougar make. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/39 "2011-04-14T19:12:04Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > Probably fantacizing about jumping his nimble young bones. She was a skanky old cougar. She wrote this particular journal entry when she was 23, so “old cougar” doesn’t apply. We can stipulate the “skanky”. ---
**Author:** ![Burton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Burton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Burton)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2011, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323/40 "2011-04-14T20:27:05Z")
“…but rather Hickman’s explicit rejection of the mob’s authority.” Human society isn’t necessarily a mob, certainly not in the instance she refers too. Of course society rejects sociopaths as it should. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-ayn-rand-idolize-a-serial-killer/578323.md?page=3)