Dagny crashes plane, sadly not dead

The BEAST reads Atlas Shrugged, so you don’t have to!
Read parts one, two, three, four, five, six & seven.

Apart from illustrating the author’s homeliness, the dust jacket says the richest, and therefore most capable and worthy of life, are disappearing from a society that’s persecuting them through regulations and tax proposals so bizarre and surreal they’d make Nicolae Ceaușescu loose his bowels. All they want to do is make things, and drain the currency out of the country, but people keep insisting on maintaining a civilization. They’re unabashed in their controversial position that money is awesome, and that existence totally exists. (more…)

BEAST philosopher-at-large Michael Caigoy reads Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged, so you don’t have to

…
Part Four: Rand Vs. Nature
(read part one, two and three)

It’s important in Atlas Shrugged to vilify Rearden’s wife, Lillian, so his betrayal can be rationalized. For an author like Rand, who has little interest in the pathos of female characters (Dagny hardly counts), shortcuts must be taken in undermining any sympathy the reader might develop. To this end, Rand picked through the literary trough and found frigidity — the gimmick wheeled out by Orwell to justify Winston’s separating from his wife, freeing him morally, to later bone Julia and brew coffee out in an old peeping-tom’s loft space. (more…)

BEAST philosopher-at-large Michael Caigoy reads Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged, so you don’t have to

…
Part Three: Ayn and the Ghost of Dead Prose
(read part one and part two)

Courtesy of ideologically_abhorrent_tattoos.com

…
While it’s definitely not a favorite (it’s not even passable), Atlas Shrugged tops a few lists for me. It has the flattest, least engaging characters I’ve dealt with. It makes the Brave New World lineup seem dimensional in comparison — and that’s saying something. It’s also the most humorless, insistent, ridiculous manifesto I’ve encountered — and I’ve read plenty of those. Worst of all, this might be the longest book I’ve ever fucking read. (more…)

BEAST philosopher-at-large Michael Caigoy reads Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged, so you don’t have to

…
Part Two: Ayn meets “Charlie’s Angels”
(read part one here)

The intellectual libertarian: outstanding in his field.

…
I’ll say one good thing about Objectivism and libertarianism’s true believers. Through some combination of their myopia, comical zealotry, self-absorption, belligerent certitude, and knee-jerk social contrarianism, they sometimes eschew breeding. Mercifully, Rand is exhibit A.

In ‘82, her heart went all Galt on her, refusing to beat, just to spite her parasitic circulatory system. It’d gotten a free ride for 77 irrational years. What’s in it for me? the organ complained. It made its point, and she died alone and childless, just over eight months after the final episode of her beloved “Charlie’s Angels” aired.

But without her inexplicable writing success and the worshipful hangers-on that followed, her conspicuous misanthropy might’ve otherwise afforded her a death under a stack of toppled newspapers. She’d have lent sustenance to her 16 reluctant cats, until the epic odor rousted her neighbors to heroic action!!! (more…)

BEAST philosopher-at-large Michael Caigoy reads Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged, so you don’t have to

…
Part One

“What is it with you and rape? No one’s raping anyone!”
— Dexter Morgan

I’ve always found Rand objectionable as a philosopher. Specifically, her uncredited middle-school re-writes of Nietzsche’s hits, and personal revelations based on really obvious tautologies. Seriously, “A” is “A”? It’s a symbol, you dingbat. It’s what we say it is. Is somebody spreading rumors that an abstract symbol isn’t itself? A legit problem is determining its relationship with our experience of reality (e.g. Wittgenstein’s language games if you’re ready for the real shit). And existence exists? Are you fucking kidding me? We’ve gone from Hume and Kierkegaard to this? Listening to her impatience at other ideologies reminds me of a five year-old considering the world’s problems. Can’t get the Chilean miners out? “Why not just build a robot?” she’d say, handing over a sketch; herself pictured overseeing the operation from a unicorn. When kids do it, it’s cute (theoretically), but seeing a brusque Russian author do it — not so much. (more…)

Tony Stark: Capitalist Übermensch

By Ellsworth Toohey Michael Caigoy

…
Robert Downey Jr. reprises his role as Hank Rearden Tony Stark, the brilliant entrepreneur who single-handedly invents a new steel alloy power source, leading to the creation of collectivist teapots the Iron Man suit.

This is a stupid, stupid movie. (more…)