# Most people get Ayn Rand's philosophy wrong **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 1, 2025, 11:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474 "2025-11-01T11:57:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![HoneyBadgerDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/honeybadgerdc/32/1033_2.png) [@HoneyBadgerDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HoneyBadgerDC)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2025, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/41 "2025-11-01T21:55:08Z")
Acting on ones own best interest firt could very well mean collaborating, cooperating and negotiating. A moral person does this. She is very vague about what constitutes self interests. I would think the long term health of my nation friends and family would be in my best self interest. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2025, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/42 "2025-11-01T22:09:05Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > What exactly is your objection to her choosing a pen name for herself? I do not object to her using a _nom-de-guerre_, and there is nothing wrong with the name (I read somewhere that it is supposed to be the Hebrew letter ע), I just prefer not to respect her (or at least not respect the vapid nonsense she spouted) by pronouncing the name correctly. It might be different if there was a need for clarity (that someone might confuse about whom I was speaking) but that situation has not arisen. ---
**Author:** ![Zoobi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/13edae/32.png) [@Zoobi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoobi)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2025, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/43 "2025-11-01T22:12:03Z")
It’s clear that Roderick is a pretty big fan of hers and probably tries to emulate her philosophy, so it’s kind of insulting to say it’s vapid nonsense. Let’s not drive away every conservative poster. ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2025, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/44 "2025-11-01T22:16:20Z")
> [@eschereal](#): > > I do not object to her using a _nom-de-guerre_ Well, _c’est la plume._ ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2025, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/45 "2025-11-01T22:30:00Z")
> [@Zoobi](#): > > It’s clear that Roderick is a pretty big fan of hers and probably tries to emulate her philosophy, so it’s kind of insulting to say it’s vapid nonsense. Let’s not drive away every conservative poster. Well, maybe “vapid nonsense” is a bit extreme. I concede that it is probably well-constructed and relatively articulate, and is probably not entirely valueless. In practice, though, it would be akin to employing agricultural practices using theory based on spherical livestock in zero-g. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2025, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/46 "2025-11-01T22:47:55Z")
> [@Zoobi](#): > > It’s clear that Roderick is a pretty big fan of hers and probably tries to emulate her philosophy Part of her philosophy, the metaphysical, and the epistemological (which I have internalized as respect for facts and attempting to avoid sloppy thinking). I do not respect her political writings, I am somewhat on the fence about her writings on ethics, and her attempts to discuss esthetics were the rankest nonsense. Also, as it happens, I am not at all conservative; I am careful. Actual reading of my posts here show attempts at clarification about ways in which people misunderstand what she wrote, not championing the philosophy itself. I don’t think it’s my fault if people get the wrong impression, as your post expresses. > [@eschereal](#): > > I just prefer not to respect her (or at least not respect the vapid nonsense she spouted) by pronouncing the name correctly. This seems like a completely different reason for mispronouncing her (pen) name than the one you first stated: > [@eschereal](#): > > I deliberately pronounce it “Ann” because “Ayn Rand” is a pseudonym for Alisa Rosenbaum. It’s a small point, but I believe you have said this before in threads about her. It seems kind of a silly place to take a stand. No doubt it’s a silly thing to let bother me. > [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](#): > > Well, _c’est la plume._ I prefer nom-de-nym, or pseudoplume. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2025, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/47 "2025-11-01T23:23:11Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > No doubt it’s a silly thing to let bother me. Given the fact that I have occasion to utter her name maybe three or four times in a given decade, it is passing trivial. It is very difficult to mispronounce her name in a posting. ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2025, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/48 "2025-11-01T23:31:56Z")
> [@eschereal](#): > > Well, maybe “vapid nonsense” is a bit extreme. I concede that it is probably well-constructed and relatively articulate, and is probably not entirely valueless. In practice, though, it would be akin to employing agricultural practices using theory based on spherical livestock in zero-g. This is a good point. The OP mentions the philosophy itself, and how well it would work in practice, which are not the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2025, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/49 "2025-11-01T23:35:52Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > She wrote what she wrote, and throwing this kind of “analysis” at it is just anti-fan wanking. She may have been and done all those things, but it says nothing about her stated philosophy. And among philosophers, her writings are the least opaque I can remember coming across (which subjects her to quite some lack of respect in the academic community). You can believe what you want about what her philosophy is, of course, but I don’t think you can justify it on this basis. I acknowledge that the part you quoted is merely my opinion about her as a person. But I stand by the previous part, which dealt with how it would work in the real world. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2025, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/50 "2025-11-02T03:11:36Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > - **Laissez-faire capitalism:** The only social system that respects individual rights is one with zero government interference, where individuals trade and interact voluntarily. > > **Key virtues and principles** > > - **Individualism:** Emphasis on the individual as an end in himself, not a means to the ends of others. > - **Productiveness:** Productive achievement is considered the noblest human activity. > - **Independence:** The virtue of thinking for oneself rather than accepting ideas without scrutiny. > - **Integrity:** Adhering to one’s rational principles and values. > - **Rational Egoism:** The view that rational self-interest is the standard of morality, and altruism (self-sacrifice) is not a moral ideal. > > **Political and social framework** > > - **Individual Rights:** Protecting the sovereignty of the individual is paramount. > - **Limited Government:** The government’s only legitimate function is to protect citizens from coercion and violence, enforce contracts, and defend the nation from foreign invaders. First laissez-faire capitalism means that individual rights don’t exist, all power is in the hands of the wealthy and they can do whatever they like to people. Of course, Objectivism/Libertarianism always holds that corporations and the wealthy can do no wrong, and all evil comes from the government. If you are being ruthlessly exploited by someone that doesn’t mean you deserve government protection; it just means you are a subhuman who _deserves to suffer._ Or die. And the point of that so-called “limited government” is to reduce government into something whose only function is to serve as an iron boot to crush the general population into submission to the wealthy. And directly contradicts the so-called “sovereignty of the individual”; there _are_ no rights under such a limited government, only power and force. Despite the noble-sounding language, the whole point is to make sure that people have no _legal_ protections, and that the government has the sole purpose of coming down like a sledgehammer on anyone who tries anything forceful out of desperation because they have no other options. > “That’s libertarians for you — anarchists who want police protection from their slaves.” ― Kim Stanley Robinson, [Green Mars](https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/69059) ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2025, 10:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/51 "2025-11-02T10:59:55Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > I don’t think the right wing as a whole ever embraced Rand’s Objectivism. And she absolutely hated Libertarians for some reason. Because she was a grifter, and Libertarianism is a competing grift that had greater popular appeal. She fancied herself an intellectual, and despite having no suitable academic background, wanted to be respected as the leader of a modern intellectual movement. Capital-L Libertarianism is a political party, which, for all its faults, engages with the realities of political change and the desires of people who are attracted to it. It attracts and motivates real people, without Rand’s philosophical pretenses. All Rand really wanted was to be worshipped as a philosopher. That was her grift. Libertarians took the heart of it (reverence of selfishness and distrust of the state) and took it in a pragmatic direction that Rand couldn’t influence, control, or claim credit for, so she resented it. ---
**Author:** ![scudsucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scudsucker/32/14101_2.png) [@scudsucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scudsucker)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2025, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/52 "2025-11-02T12:43:38Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > That is the fundamental flaw in her philosophy. I read her works as a teenager - possibly her target audience. The flaws were noticeable but I agree that this was the fundamental flaw. ---
**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:** [November 2, 2025, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/53 "2025-11-02T14:01:36Z")
Three centuries before Ayn Rand, Thomas Hobbes founded a philosophy every bit as cynical as hers. Unlike Rand, Hobbes had John Locke and later Rousseau to counter the self-serving pessimism. Rand and her fanboys have no shortage of detractors, plenty of derision, but no emergent new take on human existence besides pop-philosophy twadle stupider than hers. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2025, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/54 "2025-11-02T15:00:23Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > First laissez-faire capitalism means that individual rights don’t exist, all power is in the hands of the wealthy and they can do whatever they like to people. Of course this contention is directly countered by— > [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > “That’s libertarians for you — anarchists who want police protection from their slaves.” Mainly that in a true situation of no government, oppressive private parties would lack the protection of a state. So painting libertarianism and an-cap as merely cynical neo-feudalism is not taking all factors into account. Now it is legitimate to ask how individuals could effectively check the rise of rich and powerful private parties from becoming proto-warlords, but that’s a separate issue. ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2025, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/55 "2025-11-02T15:33:43Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > Part of her philosophy, the metaphysical, and the epistemological (which I have internalized as respect for facts and attempting to avoid sloppy thinking) Though if you remove the political and economic parts there is nothing original or innovative about Rand’s writings. There have been countless philosophies going back to the ancient Greeks based on objective reality that are much interesting. Why not go for Epicureanism? Which is based on objective reality (actually a more nuanced, IMO more useful, version than Rand’s where the sensed reality is absolute, but acknowledges it can be interpreted incorrectly) but encourages its followers to enjoy and appreciate life, cultivate friendships, and avoid politics? ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2025, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/56 "2025-11-02T15:36:14Z")
Because I’m not here to defend or support her philosophy nor to compare it to others. Why not pay attention to the focus of the thread? ---
**Author:** ![Moriarty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/moriarty/32/49_2.png) [@Moriarty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moriarty)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2025, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/57 "2025-11-02T16:58:36Z")
> [@HoneyBadgerDC](#): > > Acting on ones own best interest firt could very well mean collaborating, cooperating and negotiating. Precisely. Rand misunderstands the nature of self interest, as do most people. Explain that you shouldn’t kill people because it will increase the chance that you are killed; that’s easily accepted. But do good deeds because it increases the chances that good deeds will be done to you, and people think that’s just wishful thinking and a waste of effort. Even competition is itself a form of cooperation. Altruism is an inherently selfish act. Rand fails to understand the _reasons_ that people coalesce into societies with a common set of mores and beliefs, and chose an intellectually lazy, but emotionally fulfilling, philosophy to peddle. You want to live an entirely selfish life, Ayn Rand style? Go live in the woods away from society. Otherwise, you’re just being hypocritical and short sighted. ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2025, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/58 "2025-11-02T17:50:35Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > . Why not pay attention to the focus of the thread I still fail to see any aspect of Rand’s philosophy that is being misunderstood. All the criticisms of it on this thread, and the rebuttals of those criticisms are the same ones that have been argued about for as long as it’s existed. Particularly during the Obama era when it seemed every right winger in America was claiming to be Randian. You may disagree with those criticisms but you have not pointed out any way where they show misunderstanding of her philosophy It’s true the objective reality part does not normally feature in those arguments. But there are plenty of philosophical debates about that going back a lot further than the Obama administration (Aristotle vs Epicurus , Christian apologists vs Epicurus, etc) that don’t need to involve laissez faire economics. ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2025, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/59 "2025-11-02T18:02:11Z")
I’ve seen Rand’s philosophy of aesthetics invoked in support of anti-modernist arguments for classical, traditionalist architecture. In _The Fountainhead_, she makes exactly the opposite argument, with classicist architect Peter Keating as the foil for her modernist hero Howard Roark. (Granted, her tastes ran to a very specific brand of “individualist” modernism in the Frank Lloyd Wright vein, and she had little use for the Bauhaus movement and its kin.) ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2025, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474/60 "2025-11-02T18:26:00Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > They usually are, they just don’t realize it. People don’t want to realize how cold and uncaring objective reality is. Words like “fair” and “deserve” are generally used to try to mentally cushion people from thinking about that reality. But wishing (and praying) don’t make it so, not even a little bit. Intellectual rigor in this area is very hard to come by. This is, of course, entirely a bag of posturing fluff. The idea that anyone feels the universe of inanimate objects owes them “fairness” is an absurdity, which is why Randians choose to pummel this strawman instead of grapple with the realities of what it means to live in society with other humans. We owe _each other_ fairness and justice. The world of inanimate objects doesn’t get a say in the matter. Why would it? It has no beliefs or thoughts or opinions. It isn’t “cold or uncaring”. It’s simply a set of objects to be manipulated by _human choices_. If we want to say that government policies ought to be judged by the objective evidence of their outcomes, that’s fine as far as it goes, but physical reality has nothing at all to say about our mutual social obligations except that resources are finite. It’s simply a constraint, and to presume it has any sort of bias regarding human society or governance is a category error. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-people-get-ayn-rands-philosophy-wrong/1024474.md?page=4)