When I read The Fountainhead, as a 'teen, I was utterly amazed to discover that all my "intellectual" friends scorned it. What were they into? Why The Catcher In The Rye of course. Just compare the two heroes of those books. It was bewildering. Of course, I grew to understand more as I grew older. In any case, if anyone wants to understand what America was formulated to be and why it succeeded so well while other countries faltered and fell, all you need to do is read Rand's Textbook Of Americanism. It's all there in a mere 12 pages. Those 12 pages will explain pretty much everything you need to know about the differences between what was America and why it became great.

Your post is important............in this case, "know the enemy" +100

Thank You, K, for posting this. . we might have missed it! -- j
.

I probably should not post these articles.
but, I think it is important to read all kinds of stuff about Rand. wade thru it as you will :)

I think that thinking requires work, and most people are lazy

Of course its the statists who on the one hand talk about how bad the rich people are, but on the other hand secretly WANT to take their riches for themselves.

Montel Williams said it best once (paraphrasing)- people love the idea of being rich, but they hate the people who are rich.

I always love it when Rush Limbaugh says "The Huffington Puffington Post" before criticizing some drivel written there.
I will not be surprised if any of libtard huffing puffers of any ilk ever get around to calling Ayn Rand a racist. (That the left's favorite shut up and sit down weapon).
Anything to Democrap marginalize anyone who doesn't "(I) want to spread the wealth around," to quote King Barry, is PC open for any sort of vile villainous defamation.

Never knew that Rand never forgave Buckley for publishing that review! Thanks jabuttrick.

Nice piece. Thanks for posting it. As to the issue of deliberate or negligent misinterpretation of Rand, one of the earliest and most notable of that ilk was Whittaker Chambers' review of Atlas Shrugged published in National Review with the express consent of the publisher, William F. Buckley, Jr.. Chambers actually asserted that AS advocated for "gas chambers" and amounted to an argument for authoritarianism! Rand never forgave Buckley for publishing that libel.

LOL, glad you like.

yea. don't do the group identity deal :)

Right. According to this guess of mine, Rand + Identity Group Conflict = Nasty. You need both ingredients.

but you know us. we are not nasty.

as always, I enjoy your time in here :)

After many years in a few different industries I have come to the simple conclusion that very few Americans want to think. They don't like to think. It pains them. To read and understand any philosophy one must think.

No

No thinky...

"Sometimes I think, 'Are they talking about the same book I am?'."
Most of the times I talk to someone who's not really into it I have this reaction. On many topics the books are about exactly the opposite of what people think.

In 2000 some told me she knew someone into Ayn Rand. I told her I was totally against Ayn Rand. That was stupid of me b/c I was going by things I had heard. I had never even read a page of Rand.

I don't know why there there's such broad misunderstanding of what the books are about, but here's my guess: Like any popular idea or philosophy, politicians and groups try to co-opt it. Books on individualism and reason are incompatible with politics. When people try to co-opt Rand into a simplistic group-conflict narrative, it attracts a particularly nasty type of person. People meet those people and think they represent Rand.

Are the myths perpetrated about Ayn Rand because of a lack of knowledge, willful ignorance, evil, none of the above, all of the above, or some combination of the above?

Hello khalling,
Myth.. busted!
Yes! Separation of state and economics!
Rand has to be taken out of context and smeared to allow the Marxist, statists cover.
Regards,
O.A.

provocative title. we snagged you :) that one day

Nice read. After reading Atlas Shrugged years ago I remain surprised at the reasons people give for hating it. Sometimes I think, "Are they talking about the same book I am?". I got very different things from the book. I'd even say I was highly receptive to concepts in the book that many Objectivists either never mention or just didn't latch on to. The left simply hates the book - even if they never read it.

I think it would be fair to say she was pro wealth and pro business. As the article points out it is how you obtain the wealth that mattered to Rand.