"He [Robin Hood] is the man who became the symbol of the idea that need, not achievement, is the source of rights... " - Ragnar Danneskjöld
Happy "International Talk Like a Pirate Day!" And now, a few words from everyone's favorite pirate...
"He [Robin Hood] is the man who became the symbol of the idea that need, not achievement, is the source of rights, that we don't have to produce, only to want, that the earned does not belong to us, but the unearned does." - Ragnar Danneskjöld
"He [Robin Hood] is the man who became the symbol of the idea that need, not achievement, is the source of rights, that we don't have to produce, only to want, that the earned does not belong to us, but the unearned does." - Ragnar Danneskjöld
If one takes the misguided liberal view then yes, it was about needs.
The people were already value creators as in: butchers, bakers and candle stick makers, fleeced by those that could not otherwise create value.
As for the historical Robin Hood, if there was one, an interesting attempted account of the legend of Robin Hood is in William Manchester's A World Lit Only by Fire, The Medieval Mind and the Renaissance - Portrait of an Age:
"A Yorkshire gravestone bears this inscription:
"Hear underneath dis laihl stean
las Robert earl of Huntingtun
neer arcir yer az hie sa geud
And ipl kauld in Robin Heud
sick utlawz as he an iz men
il england nivr si agen
Obiit 24 kal Decembris 1247
"Robin Hood lived; this marker confirms it, just as the Easter tables attest to the existence of the great Arthur. But that is all the tombstone does. Everything we know about that period suggests that Robin was merely another wellborn cutthroat who hid in shrubbery by roadsides, waiting to rob helpless wayfarers. The possibility that he stole from the rich and gave to the poor is, like the tale of that other cold-blooded rogue, Jesse James, highly unlikely. Even unlikelier is the conceit that Robin Hood, aka Heud, was accompanied by a bedmate called Maid Marian, a giant known as Little John, and a lapsed Catholic named Friar Tuck. Almost certainly they were creatures of an ingenious folk imagination, and their contemporary, the sheriff of Nottingham, is probably the most libeled law enforcement in this millennium.
"The more we study those remote centuries, the unlikelier those legends become.
But there is very little evidence of what, if anything, Robin Hood may have been. Some even doubt http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&l... that the tombstone cited by Manchester (described above) is legitimate.
If Robin Hood did exist, it is unlikely that either of the emphases of the legend of the "good outlaw" for either of the competing notions of "good" is true. There is apparently no evidence for either: he would most likely have been only a ruthless outlaw stealing from whomever had something to steal, which was common at the time.
Whether or not he existed, the legend has existed for centuries in various versions in different historical stories, ballads, poems, songs, plays and movies. Ragnar in Atlas Shrugged was denouncing the common version we hear today cheering on "robbing from the rich for the poor", which is throughout the novel in different forms in contrast to Ayn Rand's ethics of reason, productivity and egoism neither sacrificing oneself to others or others to oneself.
It's QUITE A BIT MORE. It's also a great work of art, and it laid out a new, completely integrated philosophy (from metaphysics, epistemology, ethics to aesthetics) as the centerpeice of its plot (Galt's Speech).
Sounds like you need a few more reads, because there's a lot more going on there than just politics or some political warning.
But she was well aware of the parallels between the novel and the course of the country and the intellectual reasons for it. She told herself repeatedly while writing the novel that she was trying to prevent it from happening in reality. The statism is a result of the irrationalism in collectivism and self sacrifice regarded as a moral "ideal" spreading and dominating the culture. That can't be stopped without the acceptance of reason and individualism. It isn't enough to denounce the statism.
The real Robin Hood (likely Sir Robin of Loxley) championed those whom King John and the Sheriff of Nottingham had robbed, through unjust taxes and civil asset forfeiture (or its equivalent). Does that not sound exactly like the mission Ragnar set for himself? The problem, and the source of the confusion, was this: in Robin Hood's day, wealthy people were robbing the poor. The only thing that's changed today is that powerful politicians, acting ostensibly on behalf of the poor, are robbing those who have wealth but lack connections. The modern King Johns and Sheriffs of Nottingham have misappropriated the Robin Hood symbol for themselves. Ragnar is the appropriate Robin Hood for our modern age.
simply have been "robbing" the tyrants to give
the stuff back to the original earners.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfYoy...
On the other side you have "Robin of Locksley" who becomes Robin the Hood (Hood meaning outlaw) after he is declared rogue and his title and land stripped for defying John. He is romanticized in folklore for restoring to the people what was once theirs and leading a revolt which some claim ended with the signing of the Magna Carta. But he also represents a dangerous element of active rebellion that can quickly turn into mob rule.
There is a theory that consent to social security actually empowers the state legally to enslave you as you have given up your sovereignty under the national emergency declared by FDR that continues even today..
As to SS, I dont feel good about taking it, or medicare for that matter. I would never have agreed to those programs if it was up to me to subscribe to them in the first place.